


iron and silver

by Lizzen



Category: Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Dark Queen Rey, F/M, Phasma Lives
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-24
Updated: 2017-12-24
Packaged: 2019-02-19 20:59:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,139
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13132083
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lizzen/pseuds/Lizzen
Summary: Phasma survives the Supremacy, and weathers the whims of her new Queen.Set after "The Last Jedi"





	iron and silver

**Author's Note:**

> I’m very “she would _ne_ ver” about Dark Queen Rey but #yolo

When her eyes open, all she sees is blurred light. She takes a care to be precise about her awareness of her surroundings, refuses to give into panic. Submerged, she is, in something that is-- and she recognizes it. A bacta tank and by the taste of it, top of the line bacta. 

How did I-- she thinks, and closes her eyes to remember. His face, FN 2187, fully visible to her naked eye. And then flame and torment. 

Following protocol, Phasma taps on the glass and the med tech immediately pulls her out. It’s an unfortunately messy procedure, but she can manage the inconvenience and displeasure. 

When she’s clean, she messages for the General only to be told he’s indisposed due to the war effort. Breathing through her disappointment, she turns her head and wills herself to heal faster. 

There’s work to be done.

*  
The left side of her face is scarred from fire and they were unable to save her eye, but there are few who ever get to see her without her helmet. There is a precision in order that she aspires to and a distaste for anyone who thinks of her as anything other than what she is: the commander of the First Order’s stormtroopers. A force to be reckoned with. Not some, and she shudders thinking of it, weak flesh. 

And at any rate, she never meant to do much with the skin stretched over muscle and skull bones; no, no. She knows what she inspires with her real face. 

*  
It’s day three before she knows her allegiance is now due to a new Supreme Leader and she nearly throttles the doctor for this delayed information. An order is made, and armor is made available for her. It’s not her own; her own is still being mended. But the whites will do. 

She is led to the throne room and easily gets to her knees. “My fealty is yours,” are the words in her mouth, simply stated. Her head is slightly down but she’s still looking directly at him, at Kylo Ren who sits uneasily on a makeshift throne. 

“What do you think?,” he asks, and a woman’s voice speaks up from behind her.

“Take off your helmet,” the voice says.

Phasma bristles, it’s unheard of, but when he nods, she follows the order. Sets her helmet at her knees. 

A girl emerges into her sight, and looks very pale despite the fire in her eyes. “I sense her skepticism,” she says, gazing at her carefully before turning to face him. “You are new in this role. You have yet to _earn_ their fealty.”

He narrows his eyes and lifts his fist. “I crushed the Resistance, did I not?”

“You crushed an insignificant force of men and women,” she replies neatly and her gaze, locked on him, doesn’t waver. 

When he doesn’t immediately smite her for such words, Phasma learns something.

*  
The Supreme Leader calls her “Beloved.” 

The General, of course, calls her “the Problem,” but Phasma’s never minded much of what the General says unless it’s a direct order. 

She’s commanded to address her as “Her Eminence” and to follow her orders if given. Phasma reports this to her charges and bids them to follow the new protocol. She also orders a trooper she trusts to look into the girl’s history, find out how true she will be to the cause. 

*  
“Captain,” the girl says and Phasma immediately is at her elbow. 

The girl looks at her cautiously before opening her mouth: “Provide me with the entire file on FN 2187,” she orders. And she puts her hands behind her back, rising to her full height. 

There is something in the bit of her belly that turns at the serial number but duty is duty. Phasma looks down at her and nods. “I could give it you now from memory, your Eminence.” 

“I’d like the file all the same,” the girl replies. 

*  
Re-engaging her ranks is an all consuming task, but her troopers are up for it. Endless drills and check ups to confirm their loyalty. She spends at least an hour each day sparing with the best of them, determined to never be bested again. 

Without her left eye, it’s a little more complex, but Phasma lives for a challenge. 

*  
They’re bickering when she enters the throne room, and they don’t stop despite her presence. She kneels and listens until she’s heard enough. Clears her throat.

The Supreme Leader stares her down, his cheeks burning red and his gloved hands in fists. A wild thing, she thinks. The girl turns her head, looking ever so prim, and Phasma guesses that her heart rate isn’t even elevated.

“I’m at your service,” Phasma says after a long pause. 

“There’s a rebel base on the planet below, I need you to handle it,” he says shortly. 

“And I’ll go with you,” the girl says. 

Kylo Ren recoils. “You will not.” But he takes a step back when the girl raises her hand and seems to push him away from her. 

Phasma’s not seen her in battle, should be an interesting show.

*  
The rebel base is empty by the time they reach it. Phasma allows one of her troopers to push a chair over in disgust. “That’s enough,” she says quietly and the rest of them come to attention.

The girl walks the entire place, as if looking for something. Her hand sliding along surfaces, and her nose in the air as if there’s something to smell. 

“Take anything worth scavenging, captain,” the girl says at last and walks with purpose back to the ship. 

*  
The report on her is on Phasma’s desk. It reads: Rey from the planet Jakku. Scavenger, potential ties to the Resistance. Prisoner of Kylo Ren on Starkiller Base, no record of the interrogation on file. Information from Starkiller is sketchier following her apparent escape. And that’s where First Order intelligence ends. 

This is someone who keeps our Supreme Leader destabilized, she thinks. Someone who could easily take his place.

Someone to pay attention to. 

*  
“Captain,” the girl says and Phasma immediately is at her elbow. 

“Every morning, you and I will spar,” she orders. “We’ll start with staffs.”

An odd request, especially coming from a Force user, but Phasma’s curious to test her mettle. 

What she learns each morning is the girl has a brutal strength, but no finesse. Phasma smiles, and is happy to teach her. All too happy to swat her in the knees and hips, improve her form and style with each passing moment. 

There’s a politeness to the girl, nodding at Phasma after each session despite the cuts and bruises on her skin. 

*  
The Supreme Leader takes a shuttle and orders Phasma to accompany him, along with a squadron of her best. They’re meeting a Chancellor of a mining planet, and it’s important to show well. “Her Eminence?” she asks as mildly as she can. 

“Indisposed,” he replies, and she can sense his bitterness. An emperor, of course, would like to show off his queen, she thinks.

Phasma keeps to her station on the ship, and considers what it would be like to accompany the girl to such a mission. What wonders she would do without this child emperor. What she would say, how she would negotiate for the betterment of the Order. There’s a dreamlike smile on her face when the Supreme Leader shoots her a look. And she straightens, properly, and looks dead ahead.

*  
It’s all moot for rebels are waiting for them with knock out gas and weapons set to stun. An irritating business, being captured instead of killed, she thinks before passing out.

When she wakes in a makeshift prison, the Supreme Leader is leaning against a wall, smiling a little. His hands still bound. When she tilts her head to the side and leans back just a touch, he tells her: “She’s coming.” 

“Of course,” Phasma replies. 

Still, she picks at her handcuffs till she gets them off; she will be ready for battle in whatever form it presents itself. 

Screams fill their ears, then a sharp and high whine and the sound of footsteps running. It goes on for some time before the door opens. 

The girl stands in the door frame and reaches out her hand. The Supreme Leader lifts slightly off the ground and flies across the floor towards her. When they meet, her hand grips his throat. And he lets her, Phasma thinks with interest.

“Beloved,” he says with a wheeze and the girl pulls him close, closer, and crushes her lips against his. And that’s when Phasma looks away, gives them their space. 

*  
Phasma flies them back to base with a steady hand, perfect precision in some clunker of cargo freighter. She tries not to listen as the girl makes short work of him behind closed doors. 

*  
“Captain,” the girl says and Phasma immediately is at her elbow. 

“You will teach me how to fly a TIE fighter,” she orders and Phasma nods. 

In the coldness of space, Phasma finds out the girl must have been trained by a smuggler, her piloting form is so sloppy. But the ship can handle it, her speeds and twists in the air. Phasma speaks evenly, her instructions careful, and the girl learns. Adjusts to meticulous accuracy per the lessons. They avoid a haphazard death in an asteroid field, and fire at the smaller targets. 

Phasma would never admit it, but it was a pleasant excursion.

In the hanger, she makes a salute when the girl descends the gangplank. And the oddest thing occurs: the girl gets close, closer still, and wraps her arms around her. An embrace between friends. Panic rises inside of her and Phasma straightens to her full height. 

When the girl disengages, there’s an amused smile on her face.

*  
Phasma serves as the girl’s bodyguard at a state dinner with the Republic’s newly elected president. Carefully watches the food and drink poured. Carefully watches all exits and windows in the opulent room. While the Supreme Leader is quiet and sullen, his queen is a charming conversationalist, seemingly knowing the interests of each person she speaks to. Not exactly elegant, Phasma thinks, considering how Snoke would have dealt with this soirée, but personable. 

She may yet be the leader we need, Phasma thinks. 

There’s a man at the end of the table, a pleasant sort of person who entertains everyone in his vicinity. He continues to stare at the girl when he thinks no one is looking, and Phasma looks at no one else but him for the rest of the night.

When the dinner is done, and the work really begins, she watches the man approach the girl and take her hand for a kiss. Phasma looks up to the heavens, bored of such behavior, but when she looks back, the girl is pink cheeked as if he said or did something telling. She begins to walk towards them, but the girl makes the signal for Phasma to be still. Now in earshot, she hears the man speak of a city in the clouds and the fastest ship in the galaxy.

“Have you heard of the Millenium Falcon?” the girl asks. “I’ve flown it.”

He doesn’t quite smile. 

“That’s it,” she thinks, and runs a face recognition in her helmet’s scopes. CALRISSIAN, the report says. KNOWN REBEL. It would be all too easy to lift her weapon and destroy him, him, a likely leader of the new rebellion. This was all a ruse to get him to speak with the queen, and her blood feels like ice.

“Your Eminence,” she calls out, voice like silk. 

The girl lifts her hand, a warding sign. And something seems to push Phasma away, at a distance from her despite her feet staying planted in place. “A moment,” she says and returns to her conversation with the scum. 

Phasma hates herself for doing it, but she turns to look at the Supreme Leader, only to find him fully distracted by the Republic president, and everything falls into place. 

She could make a scene, she could let it play out. Phasma breathes in and holds it too long, considering her options. And then the man departs, having kissed the girl’s hand again. 

“Kill that man,” she orders quietly to her troopers but he vanishes into the many corridors of the facility. 

*  
The girl stands next to her on the ride back to the ship. “Their cause is doomed,” she tells her, quietly, so quiet that Phasma can barely hear. “Let me help it die.” 

*  
She should tell the Supreme Leader. It’s her duty to do so. But she--

But she doesn’t. 

Some fealty is often given; but sometimes it is earned. 

*  
“Captain,” the girl says and Phasma immediately is at her elbow. 

#


End file.
